This invention relates to an oil pan construction and more particularly to an improved oil pan construction for an internal combustion engine.
A wide variety of oil pan or crankcase constructions have been employed for internal combustion engines. One form of oil pan utilizes a steel stamping for the oil pan. Although such arrangements have the advantage of low cost, they add nothing to the structural rigidity of the engine and can present some problems with respect to noise transmission. In another type of oil pan construction, there is a skirt portion that is formed from a casting, frequently from a light weight alloy, that is bolted to the underside of the cylinder block. This skirt portion has a substantial downwardly facing opening across which a blanking plate is positioned. It has been normally the practice to bolt the skirt portion to the cylinder block with threaded fasteners and the blanking plate to the skirt portion with another set of threaded fasteners. This provides not only a complicated arrangement, but also requires the offsetting of the bolt circles so as to afford accessibility for all of the bolts. Also, with this type of arrangement, it is normally necessary to remove the blanking plate before the skirt portion can be removed. This is not always desirable.
It is, therefore, a principal object of this invention to provide an improved oil pan construction for an internal combustion engine.
It is a further object of this invention to provide an improved oil pan construction for an internal combustion engine that utilizes a cast skirt member and which can be easily affixed to the cylinder block along with the blanking plate.